If the good and the law are objective, why can neither the objective good nor the universal rule determine what must be done in the concrete case?

This seminar begins with a listener’s question about a large donation to a shul. Even after Seminar 9 established that transferring money to a charitable institution does not automatically constitute צדקה, an objectively good result still occurred: the shul can now be expanded. Why does that not establish that the donor performed a good and formative deed?

To answer, we distinguish three levels:

• an objectively good result;

• an objectively fitting deed;

• the virtuous performance of that deed.

The goodness of the result does not automatically establish that this was the right action for this agent, in this amount, at this time, and in this manner. Yet habituation c ...